


Ignorant Bliss

by callmenovak



Category: Criminal Minds (US TV), NCIS
Genre: Anti Gibbs, Anti McGee, Eventual Happy Ending, Happy Ending, Jemily if you squint, M/M, Slow Burn, anti Ziva
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-02
Updated: 2020-09-01
Packaged: 2021-03-06 17:00:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 13,080
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26242306
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/callmenovak/pseuds/callmenovak
Summary: The BAU and NCIS clash on a case and are forced to team up, how does Hotch and his team react to seeing the treatment of Tony Dinozzo and the behaviour of Gibbs and his team? When a case ends badly Tony questions his position in NCIS and on Gibbs' team.
Relationships: Aaron Hotchner/Spencer Reid, Anthony DiNozzo/Jethro Gibbs, Jennifer "JJ" Jareau/Emily Prentiss
Comments: 15
Kudos: 334





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I kinda suck at summary's so thank you for checking this out :)

“I’d like to see you actually use your Phys Ed major for once Tony” McGee laughed at Tony as he tried to transfer files from the plasma to his and the team’s laptops, Tony stayed silent as the insults were thrown at him. Eventually they’d stop and McGee would help him and then they could get back to work. It was a cruel and vicious cycle but Tony dare not speak up about it. 

He repeatedly pressed the enter key on his keyboard until McGee came over to his desk and snatched away the keyboard, Ziva laughed and Gibbs paid no attention to his team antics as usual. Gibbs silence probably hurt Tony the most, the others made fun of him but Gibbs ignored Tony and the rest of the team’s bullying towards him. 

A beep sounded on everyone’s laptops signalling the files and McGee dropped the keyboard back onto Tony’s desk with a bang, Gibbs finally looked up and Tony hoped it was to tell McGee or Ziva to stop laughing. 

“What do we have?” Gibbs said, taking off his reading glasses. 

Tony sighed. 

McGee and Ziva both jumped up to get their say in before the other and impress Gibbs, McGee snatched the controller to the plasma first and Ziva sat down in a huff. Tony rolled his eyes at their antics.

“Abby confirmed the victim to be petty officer Daniel Hennings,38, no current address, his last being his childhood home where his mother still lives, father died when Daniel was 9. Daniel had a couple minor charges for theft and trespassing” McGee finished and Ziva jumped up to snatch the controller away. 

“The motel room had no fingerprints except the cleaner who works at the motel and our victim, Hennings was stabbed nine times in the chest and the chair in the middle of the room was definitely where he was tortured before his death” Ziva clicked and the picture of the chair with ropes around the leg and arms of the chair showed up on the plasma “The suspect has definitely had training or done this before, those knots and the wounds on the victim are not done by an amateur” Ziva looked over to Gibbs for praise but when she got none she huffed and threw the controller to Tony who thankfully caught it. 

“Bouncing off of Ziva’s last bit, I found three other cases similar to this one” He pulled up the pictures from the other crime scene “And boss you’re not going to like this but on the last murder the local police called the BAU from the FBI so we should be expecting-”

The elevator doors opened and out walked 6 people. 

The one in the suit walked forward first and over to where Gibbs was sitting.

“I’m SSA Aaron Hotchner from the BAU, this is Special Agent’s Derek Morgan, David Rossi, Spencer Reid, Emily Pretniss and Jennifer Jareu” 

Gibbs glared at them and looked up to where Director Shepard was walking down the stairs, She walked over and glared back at Gibbs. She looked up to Aaron Hotchner; she smiled politely and shook the agents hand. 

“Welcome Agent Hotcher”

“Hotch, please”

“Hotch” She corrected “I’m Director Shepard, these are Special Agents Gibbs, Tony Dinozzo, Timothee McGee and Ziva David”

Everyone shook Hotch’s hand except for Gibbs.

“They are investigating a serial killer and our petty officer is the most recent victim, I’ve spoken to Fornell and he’s agreed to compromise and have equal jurisdiction” Shepard said, Gibbs was going to protest but Shepard raised her hand and gestured for him to follow her. The pair walked away and heard Gibbs raising his voice at Shepard.

The two teams stood awkwardly until Dinozzo decided to take charge. 

“Have you been brought up to speed on the most recent victim yet?” He asked, he walked into the middle of the bullpen and beckoned the opposite team to walk in.

“No, we only found out about this case when we were on the jet”

Tony paused at the mention of a jet and looked at Hotch in disbelief, he quickly shook his head and moved that into a ‘talk about it later’ box in his mind. 

“Daniel was found face down on the floor with nine stab wounds and tortue marks all over his body, from the way the crime scene looks we can assume he was tortured while tied to a chair, stabbed in the chest 9 times and then the suspect cut the ropes and let him fall to the floor”

“Definitely the fourth in our case, all the cases are the exact same except for the number of knife wounds although that would be a key part of our profile, the quick deterioration of the unsub’s mentality”

“What else do you have in the profile?” McGee asked with his arms crossed, Hotch was obviously smart and knew a lot more about the case and McGee was insulted that he could just walk into his space and act like he was better than him.

“Male, late 30’s early 40s, strong build, had an abusive father who died when the unsub was in his late teens and the father was in his 40s, we believe he is using his victims as a surrogate for what he could never due to his father” 

“How do you know all of this?” Ziva accused.

“Profiling, the BAU stands for Behavioral Analysis Unit, we asses the victimology first and then the unsub-”

“You keep using that word, unsub?” Ziva cut off Hotch.

“Unidentified subject” A man from behind Hotch spoke up, Spencer Reid, Tony thought, was tall and lanky and gripped onto his messenger bag like a lifeline, he looked awkward but obviously spoke up when Hotch was being questioned, loyal, Tony guessed that he was going to like this man. Ziva didn’t, she didn’t even look at Reid for more than a second. McGee stepped closer to Hotch, Tony guessed he was going to make a snide remark when Gibbs walked back into the group and cut mcGee off before he could say anything.

Gibbs phone rang and he answered it, after a couple shot clipped words on Gibbs’ side he hung up. 

“We’ve got another body” Gibbs said “Gear up” He ordered and the team grabbed their jackets and bags. 

The BAU took the first elevator down while the team waited in silence, no one dared make eye contact or even speak to Gibbs. 

The elevator doors finally opened up and the team stepped in, they were only in there 3 seconds before Ziva surged forward and shut the power off.

“We are not seriously working with these people!?” Ziva said. Gibbs turned to her, annoyed.

“Unfortunately we are, Director Shepard refused to listen to me” Gibbs said, he leaned forward and turned the elevator back on.

Tony was going to say how he quite liked these people but decided to skip the remarks about ‘how he would’ with a side eye or any jokes insulting his intelligence.

\---

Hotch got out of the car and stood waiting for the other group, he knew the team were excited to see and work with another advanced team but had all been let down by everyone on the other team except for Tony Dinozzo. 

Dinozzo seemed to be the only rational one and didn’t make any snide remarks or mocking them silently, he could tell that the others made Dinozzo uncomfortable and/or embarrassed him by their rudeness.

Gibbs and the team turned up shortly after their arrival and walked into the motel room without sparing even a glance to Hotch and the group who followed after Gibbs.

This was different. Hotch thought.

The victim had a cut all the way down his chest, his organs on show. 

The maid standing at the back of the room had a hand to her mouth and Emily quickly moved over to her and walked her out of the room, he could faintly hear the sound of someone throwing up outside once the two women made it out the room. 

An old man and a younger one walked into the room carrying boxes. 

“My my, not a pretty sight” The older one said, kneeling down next to the body.

“Can you still perform an autopsy?” McGee asked. So the men were Medical Examiners, they had their own medical examiners at NCIS?

“Most certainly, the cut the suspect has made is an inconvenience, but yes” The man said, he tilted his head when he looked at the head of the man “Palmer, pass me the tongs and tweezers”

The man named Palmer did as instructed and passed the tools over quickly. 

The older man used the tongs to open the victim’s mouth, Hotch and Spencer both peered over to look into the mouth and saw a piece of ripped cloth stuffed into the mouth, they both turned their heads towards each other at the same time and Spencer smiled awkwardly at how close they were and leaned back. 

The medical examiner used the tweezers to pull the cloth out and he held it high in the air and passed the tweezers over to Morgan without paying attention to who it was he was handing it to. Morgan stood there awkwardly with the tweezers holding the wet cloth in his hand, he could hear Rossi stifle a laugh.The man kneeling on the floor stood up and finally looked over to who was holding the tweezers.

“Oh my, I am sorry” The man took the tweezers back and handed them to Palmer “Where are my manners, I’m Doctor Ducky Mallard and this is Jimmy Palmer” 

“Time of death Duck?” Gibbs asked, he was stressed, that much was obvious, he was obviously trying to ignore the new team’s presence. Wouldn’t work for long. 

“Jethro I-” Ducky huffed “I would say around 4 hours, not long at all but we’ll know more when we get him back” 

“DiNozzo, sketches?” Gibbs asked, Dinozzo nodded and held up the notepad “Ziva and-” Gibbs looks up to Hotch “What’s the name of the women with the maid?”

“Prentiss”

“Ziva go find Prentiss and interview the maid, McGee take-” He looks up to Hotch and silently asks who should go with McGee.

“Morgan” Hotch says, McGee obviously feels threatened by everyone on the team, evident from when they met, so Morgan can definitely deal with keeping him in check and intimidating him.

“Find out who was staying here and get a list of everyone in the building, also see if there's any security cameras” 

Morgan nods to McGee and they both leave the room.

Spencer is looking around the room and Rossi steps closer to Hotch. 

“This is a big time jump, from stabbing to slicing, and it’s only been two days inbetween kills now” Rossi says, Hotch nods along. 

“This is one of the quickest escalations I’ve seen, only four kills before this?” Rossi questions, Hotch turns to him.

“You think there's more victims?” Hotch asks, Rossi shakes his head.

“I don’t think this is a simple escalation I think he’s on a psychotic break, I wouldn’t be surprised if he was a drinker too” 

Hotch nods his head, definitely would make more sense and answer a few questions. The drinking would explain why the cut was so wavy and jagged, if the slit throat didn’t kill the victim the cut could be explained by the victim being alive but it was a post mortem wound evident from the lack of blood.

Ziva and Prentiss walked back in and everyone turned to face them, Prentiss sent an annoyed look over to Hotch, he was sure he would hear about what caused it later when they got in the car.

“The maid was unhelpful, she arrived to work at 0900 and found the body while going door to door at 10” Ziva pouted and put her notepad in her pocket. 

Dinozzo came back into the room.

“Guys, I’ve got something” He says and everyone follows him out, he leads everyone to the dumpsters behind the motel and points down. In a broken bin, probably from one of the rooms in the motel, was vomit, a receipt and slither of rope. Most likely the unsubs things and stomach contents.

“McGee, bag it,” Gibbs said.

“Boss, I think we should leave that to Dinozzo, he is the Senior Field Agent after all” Mcgee says and Ziva grins, Dinozzo looks up suddenly. 

“I found the bin, I did the work already,” He says. 

“You can use your big strong phys ed muscles to carry the bin” Ziva pokes at Tony’s arms, Gibbs stares at Dinozzo and he visibly deflates. Mcgee gleefully hands the bag over to Tony and the group walks away.

Hotch and the team were watching in disbelief, the others had blatantly made fun of Dinozzo and insulted him and Gibbs did nothing.

Morgan walks forward and snatches the bag from Tony. 

“I got it” He says and Tony smiles at him gratefully, he turns to look at his team but frowns when they’re gone and walking back to the car already. 

He goes to follow after them but Rossi stops him. 

“Why don’t you ride with us? I saw the films by your desk and I’m sure Reid would love to talk about them with you” 

Tony looks over to Spencer who nods enthusiastically, Tony had many of the films he had watched and loved on display, Tony had great taste. Tony then looks over to Hotch for confirmation who nods back.

“Sure” Tony grins and follows the team to their cars, he looks over to his own team’s car and sees that they had already left without him. 

Spencer looks to where Tony’s looking and anger rushes through him when he also sees that Tony’s team has left him. Spencer quickly walks over to Tony and waves to get his attention, Tony turns to him with a confident smile. Spencer was about to profile Tony and his ‘confident’ mask but had to remind himself of the rule to not to profile his colleagues.

“What is your opinion on silent cinema?” Reid asks, Tony’s real smile pulls through and he dives into a full length explanation about it’s pros and also it’s few cons. The rest of the team smile and listen fully to Tony’s explanation when they get into the car and laugh at Reid’s interruptions of fun facts about the subject. 

\---

The BAU and Tony all walk out of the elevator chatting away happily and then they reach the bullpen where the other team are sitting with agitated looks, Tony goes silent and walks over to his desk and sits down. 

A girl in a goth outfit barrels into the bullpen and to Gibbs’ desk.

“You said you have something for me?” She said, Gibbs nods and points to Morgan. The goth turns to him and grins as she looks over the newcomers. Morgan hands her the bin and she nods thankfully.

“Abby” She says and smiles once everyone gives their names, she then runs back out and into the elevator she appeared out of.

The team are amused by the scientist and can’t help but be reminded of Garcia. 

“Do you have a room where we can set up?” Hotch says, looking at Gibbs. 

“Conference room” He says without looking up from his computer. The rest of Gibbs’ team make no move to show them where it is so Tony stands up and the team follows behind him. 

He opens the door and walks in while the team each take a seat around the long table and pull out files from their bags, Spencer walks over to a white board in the corner and brings it over to the head of the table. 

“I’ll be back soon” Tony says, he leaves and the team share glances with each other.

“I can’t be the only angry one here?” Emily says after taking her seat next to JJ, the team shake their heads.

“I’d like to speak to Dinozzo first but I will definitely be speaking to the Director about the behaviour of her agents, especially the behaviour against Dinozzo” Hotch says, the team talk about what they all got on the case but it’s not long until the conversation drifts back to Tony. 

“Agent David wouldn’t let me get a word in with the maid and told the maid she could leave before I could ask any questions myself” Emily says, JJ shakes her head disappointedly and pats Emily’s thigh in comfort. 

“Similar thing with McGee, I’d start to say one thing and he’d cut me off and ramble about unimportant statistics and gloated about his computer system when the owner showed us his” Morgan said “I managed to get two copies of the security footage so we can see it whenever we need” 

Everyone went silent when the door opened and Tony walked in.

“We’re going to watch the footage now” He seemed oblivious to the silence and walked away, everyone followed him out and into the bullpen. 

Ziva mumbled something under her breath about how long they took to get there and everyone ignored it, Tony saw a muscle in Hotch’s jaw jump when Ziva made the remark and smirked slightly. 

McGee played the security footage from the motel, he skips to the approximate time given by Ducky and they all watch as a man wearing all black picks the lock to the room and locks it behind him. McGee skips the footage again to when the man leaves the room, he has removed his jacket and is wiping his face down with it. 

Gibbs curses as the suspect turns before the camera can see his face. 

“Zoom in there,” Dinozzo says and points to the man’s arm, everyone tries to see what Dinozzo sees and waits for McGee to zoom in.

McGee does so and enhances the picture onto the man’s bicep, his short sleeved shirt exposes a tattoo. 

“A lion tattoo” McGee says, he walks behind his computer “I’ve sent it to everyone to look at it closer”

“Good job” Gibbs says, Dinozzo looks up at Gibbs but sees him looking at McGee. Tony sighs, Gibbs rarely ever gives praise and when he does it’s almost never to Tony.

Abby runs into the bullpen again and points to McGee. 

“Put the video I just sent you on!” She shouts gleefully.

McGee brings up the video and it shows a man walking into a convenience store and buying the basic things; gum and a newspaper. Finally, the man goes to pay and his shirt sleeve rides up to reveal a lion tattoo.

Gibbs turned to Abby who’s almost about to burst.

“I looked at the receipt and found the name of the place, based on location I found the nearest one and got the security footage from the place, McGee sent me the footage earlier and I noticed the tattoo and I was going to tell you but then I found this and I went through this security footage so I immediately came up here and now I’m telling you this” She sucked a deep breath in and Gibbs handed her a big red cup that was sitting on his desk called ‘Caf-Pow’.

“Did you get a name?” Gibbs asked after she had drunk down half the cup, Abby gasped and hit her head.

“Yes! Sorry sir, it’s a Matthew Dancy” 

“Address?” 

“Sent to you” 

Gibbs kissed Abby’s temple and turned to everyone, everyone stood silently until it clicked. They all walked quickly to the elevator and prepared to finally catch this guy. 

\---

When Hotch and the team were in the car and driving to the unsub’s address, Rossi turned to Hotch from the passenger seat. 

“In cases like this you know they mostly end in suicide by cop”

“I’m aware”

“Do you think Gibbs and the others are?”

“No”

Rossi turned his eyes back to the road and faintly listened to the music that was bleeding through Morgan’s earphones. 

The rest of the ride was mostly silent, the only talk coming from Reid spilling facts about places they pass. Hotch smiles at Spencer whenever he catches the younger man's eye in the rearview mirror and he ducks his head with a smile in response. 

Rossi rolled his eyes at the two, even after all this the two of them are still in denial about the other’s feelings, give him and Morgan enough time and the two will be locked in a closet and forced to talk things out finally. 

When they arrive at the small house they get ready and with their vests on they storm the house, Hotch passes a door which is partly hidden by how it blends into the wall.

Hotch looks up to only see Dinozzo and Morgan down the hall, he gets their attention quietly and gestures to the door. The two nod and quickly make their way over silently, Hotch shouts the usual orders of ‘we’re the FBI’ and gets nothing but silence in return.

Morgan kicks in the door and Hotch makes his way down the stairs, followed closely by Dinozzo. 

The light source is a swaying lightbulb from the ceiling, swaying, moving, in a still house. 

Hotch scans the room and out walks Matthew with a gun trained on Hotch. 

“Put the weapons down” Matthew shouts and Hotch could hear noises coming from the top of the staircase, the rest of the teams were here. 

“Put yours down first Matthew” Hotch says calmly, Matthew reeks of beer and his whole look is disheveled. 

Matthew shakes his head violently and the gun shakes all over Hotch's body, his head jerks back up and looks straight at Hotch. 

“You-” He starts, tears well in his eyes and Hotch realises that Matthew is seeing Hotch as his father, not good.

It all happened in a split second.

Matthews finger twitches on the trigger, Morgan’s gun goes off and Dinozzo jumps onto Hotch and brings him down to the floor. 

It takes a couple seconds to process what just happened and Tony rolls off of Hotch and lands beside him, he yelps in pain and Hotch quickly gets to his knees and looks down at Tony. 

Blood is quickly pooling at his shoulder and Hotch quickly shrugs his blazer off and balls it up, he presses it to the wound and Morgan is shouting for a medic. The rest of the team makes their way down the stairs, Dinozzo’s team stays back though which makes Hotch’s blood boil. 

“Tony, hey, keep your eyes open ok? Look at me” Hotch repeats, Tony blearly looks up at Hotch and attempts to smile but winces.

“Yes sir” He mumbles, Hotch smiles. 

“Tony!” Hotch shouts as Tony’s eyes start to close, his eyes open back up.

“I was just blinking” Tony groans, Hotch rolls his eyes.

Hotch feels a hand on his shoulder and sees Spencer with the paramedics behind him, he looks back down at Tony.

“The medics are here now, ok?” Hotch says, Tony nods. Hotch stands up and is quickly enveloped in a hug from Spencer, he grips back onto the genius and smiles into his hair. 

When they break Hotch looks over to Tony’s team. Gibbs is the only one showing any amount of concern and it's only shown through a wrinkle line, Ziva and McGee are bickering like children, Hotch doubts they’ve even noticed that Tony is with medics now and is being taken to the ambulance. 

Hotch can tell the rest of the team are the same anger Hotch is feeling too, he reaches into his pocket and pulls out his phone, he sends an email and quickly shoves the phone back away. Spencer read what Hotch had written over his shoulder and he hid his smile. 

Everyone went back up the stairs of the basement and let out a breath when they made it outside, time seemed to move in slow motion when they were walking back to their cars. Sirens wailed and flashed, doors slammed shut and tires squealed as they sped back off. 

\---

They finally arrived at the hospital but were forced to wait in the waiting room, thankfully they got an empty one. Tony’s team sat in the corner of the room, Gibbs wouldn’t sit down and the other two sat silently. 

Spencer tapped his foot anxiously but when he looked up at Ziva he stopped, when she looked away from him he started again and didn’t pay attention to her angry glares. Morgan noticed this and covered his mouth to stop himself from laughing. 

JJ was being a mother hen and bringing everyone drinks and food from the vending machines. 

“Who’s here for Anthony Dinozzo?” The nurse said looking up from her clipboard, her eyes widened when all of them immediately stood up (save Gibbs who was already standing).

“Can two people follow me please” 

After a quick and silent conversation, Hotch and Gibbs stood forward and followed behind the nurse.

They walked into Tony’s room who was looking at the ceiling, when he spotted Gibbs he quickly sat up. Hotch could tell by the whitening off his fists and his toes curling under the blankets that it caused him a lot of pain but by his face he looked fine, his ability to mask was scarily good. 

“Hey boss” He grinned.

“What the hell were you thinking?” Gibbs said and smacked Tony’s head, Hotch’s eyes shot to Gibbs who was standing next to Tony’s bed. 

“I wasn’t, it was a split second decision” Tony said, he shifted in his bed and he got defensive. 

“Don’t do that again, it was stupid” 

“No it wasn’t” 

“Excuse me?” 

“That bullet would have gone straight through Hotch’s chest, I acted as I saw fit and came out with a shoulder wound” 

Gibbs glared down at Tony, Hotch watched and saw Tony deflate. 

“Sorry boss, won’t happen again” He finally said, Gibbs nodded and walked out of the room after putting the flowers that JJ had brought onto the bedside table. Hotch walked over and sat in the chair beside Tony. 

“Does that happen often?” 

“Getting shot or Gibbs’ love and affection” Tony joked, he knew what Hotch meant but he put up that confident barrier again, Hotch stayed silent and eventually Tony gave up “The head slaps are almost everyday, it’s not that bad. The tough love is everytime I do something ‘stupid’” He said with air quotes.

“I wanted to ask you something, you don’t have to answer right away but I want you to know that I sent an email today to my boss about having you in my team, I got the answer a couple hours ago and you got accepted with flying colours” 

“So what you’re saying-”

“You have a job at the BAU with me and my team if you want it, I also want your permission to report your team’s behaviour”

“Can I think about it? What would you say on the report?” 

“Sure and it would only be the truth about your team and what’s happened on this case”

Tony slowly nodded and a smile formed on his face. 

“Thank you Hotch,” He said and looked up to the door where Ziva and McGee had just arrived, the smile immediately dropped. Hotch nodded and patted Tony’s hand as a silent ‘good luck’ and left. 

Ziva sat down in the empty seat and stared at Tony, McGee stood at the end of the bed

“That was stupid Tony” Ziva said “You could have killed yourself” She hits Tony’s arm, Tony keeps the intense pain from showing on his face.

“Not everything’s a movie” McGee speaks up from the end of the bed. 

Tony stays silent through the hurtful jokes and thinks over Hotch’s offer.

He wouldn’t have to deal with the head slaps or jokes insulting his intelligence and abilities, he could challenge himself more and he would have a team who actually cared about him and made sure he was ok. 

Tony didn’t need time to think, he’d made up his mind. 

He waited until the two left the room laughing and called the nurse back in to get Hotch. 

\---

Tony stepped out of the elevator and was met with Shepard standing in front of him, he looked away and walked over to his desk with Shepard following close behind. He checks his watch, half an hour before the team comes in to start work, he’d gotten up early to make sure he avoids them. 

“Tony” Shepard pleads. 

Tony sighs and puts the soon-to-be-full box down on his desk, he looks up at her. 

“I understand why you’re leaving and I support your decision, I’ve put in good words at the FBI from me” 

Tony’s eyes widened, he was expecting a ‘please don’t go’ speech or some crap promises about how she and the team would change. 

“Thank you director” He said, the director walked around his desk and hugged him, he hugged back and smiled. There was no doubt he’d miss this place and it’s orange walls but he also knew it was the best decision for him.

Tony sat down in his chair, opened the cabinets to his desk and started piling things into the box. He opened the box containing all of Gibbs’ rewards he never accepted and smiled sadly, he got up out of his chair and placed them down on Gibbs’ desk along with his badge and gun. 

He returned to his desk and piled the rest of the various items into the box, he pulled the letters out of his blazer pocket and placed it on his desk. There were four and were addressed to Abby, Ducky, Palmer and, the one that took the longest, Gibbs. 

He heaved the heavy box under his arm and made his way over to the elevator.

He had already ended his contract to his apartment and had rented a new apartment in Quantico, it was a lot bigger than his old one and had a bigger kitchen so he could cook more. The elevator door opens and he sighs, this was it...

End of a chapter.


	2. Chapter 2

Tony pushed the glass doors to the BAU open and was immediately bombarded with cheers and hugs from his new team. He could see Hotch and Rossi walking down from their office over the top of JJ’s head. 

“Glad to have your here Dinozzo”

“Tony” He corrected Hotch, he nodded “happy to be here” Tony smiles.

A woman in bright clothes runs out of her office, and jumps onto Tony in a hug. Tony looks down at the woman and notices how she is the complete opposite of Abby in dress sense. 

“Hi I’m Penelope Garcia, I wasn’t with you on your case but I’m the technical analyst, you need to know something I’m your gal” She rambles.

“Tony Dinozzo” He puts his hand out and Garcia shakes it happily, JJ’s phone rings and she frowns when she answers it. 

“I hate to do this but we’ve got a case” 

“Wheels up in 10”

\---

Gibbs gripped his coffee and walked out the elevator, Ziva and McGee were crowded round Dinozzo’s desk. He silently walked over to them and peered over Ziva’s shoulder, Dinozzo’s desk was empty and four letters lay on it. 

Gibbs clenched his jaw and stormed off to the stairs, he walked up the stairs jumping them three steps each stride. He sent on a look to Cynthia to shut her up and slammed the director’s door open.

“Jethro I-” Shepard started and put her glasses down on top of a stack of files. 

“Where the hell is my agent?” Gibbs shouts. 

“He’s transferred to the BAU” Shepard deadpans, she leans back in her chair and prepares for Gibbs childish tantrum. 

“Why wasn’t I told about this?” 

“I only found out yesterday and it was a decision on Dinozzo’s part to not let anyone know” 

“He’s my agent I should have been informed” Gibbs says, when Shepard doesn’t respond he walks out of her office and slams the door. 

Gibbs leaves the office and everyone’s eyes are on him, he glares at them and feels the eyes drop. Ziva and McGee are arguing about something and Gibbs storms past them. 

He sits down at his desk and looks down at Tony’s gun and badge on his desk, he drops his head into his hands and rubs his face. When he looks back down he spots a stack of his medals that Tony kept in his desk, Gibbs feels a stab of hurt and picks the badges up and slams them down in a random drawer.

“Stop arguing and get to work” Gibbs orders after he moves Tony’s things to the side of his desk, Ziva goes to protest but one look at Gibbs and she closes her mouth. Abby runs into the bullpen and over to Tony’s desk, she looks down heartbroken. She reaches over the lamp and picks up the letter with her name on it, a tear drops onto the envelope and she quickly rushes back down to her lab. 

Gibbs watches the whole thing and sighs, Abby wasn’t going to properly work for a while now. He remembers seeing a letter addressed to him on Tony’s desk but he pushed that to the back of his mind and opened a case file that he needed to work on. 

\---

Tony was speechless as he walked onto the jet, the team laughed at him playfully at his shock. He dropped down into a chair and looked around the interior of the jet, it was extremely nice and definitely a step up from the usual car or NCIS van he drove. 

JJ handed him and everyone else a file and then took a seat next to him. 

“Five already dead, found in their bedrooms, all lived alone and were women in their late 20’s to early 30’s, cause of death was strangulation” JJ said, everyone continued to quickly read through the file “The most recent victim was Sarah Hidgens and her body was found two hours ago” 

Rossi held up a picture of the hand wounds around one of the victim’s neck.

“Sexual sadist?” Rossi asked, the team made noises of agreement “Strangulation is up close and person and you see the victims face before they die so definitely a confident unsub who gets off on their death”

“The pattern of all of the women living alone shows that the unsub is stalking the victims, unemployed or working independently” Spencer adds, everyone nods.

“Spencer, Morgan and Dinozzo go to the crime scene and see if you can find anything, JJ and Emily visit the victim’s family and get everything you can on the victim, the rest of us will set up at the police station” Hotch commands.

The team nodded and settled into their seats to get comfortable, Morgan looked to Tony who was sitting across from him.

“What games do you play?” Morgan asked.

“Games?” 

“Chess, poker?”

“Both actually, I played chess as a kid and my frat played poker every friday night” Tony grinned, he waited for the jokes about his frat to be made but when there were no comments made he faltered. 

“Spencer here is king at chess and I wouldn’t suggest poker with him” Morgan pats Spencer’s shoulder who is smiling gleefully. 

“Do you have chess here?” Tony asked and smiled when Morgan got up and returned with a chess board, Spencer quickly set it up on the table in between them. 

They started playing and the rest of the team watched on, immersed.

“Check mate” Tony announced and threw his hands up in the air, Spencer furrowed his brows and looked down at the chess board as if it had hurt him. The team cheered for Tony and Morgan laughed at Spencer.

“Sorry Reid but chess was the only game I had as a child, I got good” Tony and the team laughed, it felt good to be laughed along with instead of at. 

Spencer’s resolve broke and he smiled, he nodded to Tony in defeat. 

The rest of the plane ride was filled with small conversations and Tony looking out the window. 

“Don’t go on a plane much?” JJ asked Tony after watching him stare out the window, Tony turned to her.

“If NCIS ever flew it was on the back of a cargo plane” Tony responded, the rest of the team turned over to Tony in disbelief. 

“What did you do if you needed to, you know?” Emily asked.

“Bag,” Tony answered like it was the most normal thing. Tony continued staring out of the window oblivious to the eyes on him, the others slowly got back to their conversations.

They finally landed and quickly made their way off the jet and into the SUV’s and over to where they were ordered to go. Morgan got into the driver's seat and Dinozzo got into the passenger seat. Morgan notices Tony fist his hand and his knuckles whiten.

“You okay?” Morgan asks, Tony looks up at him confused and then down to his hands, his hands immediately relax and he looks back up to Morgan.

“Force of habit sorry, Gibbs and Ziva’s driving is very, um, extreme” Tony chuckles and flexes his hands, Morgan nods and when driving he makes sure he drives the speed limit and carefully.

They arrive at the crime scene and make their way up to the small house. 

Morgan and Spencer go in through the front door but Tony walks around back, he slides along the wall and side steps when he notices a footstep in the mud. He makes it into the garden and to the back door, he crouches down and sees that the lock has been picked. The scrapes from one of the lock picking tools is still evident on the door, 

Tony puts his gloves on and opens the door, he walks in and hear’s Morgan and Spencer’s voices from upstairs. He follows the voices into the bedroom and sees Morgan holding pictures of where Sarah’s body was up to the bed. 

“The suspect is a size 11 and his footprint is in the track by the side of the house so he is 5’10 to 6’2 and he picked the back door lock to get into the house” Tony says while looking through the victim’s belongings on the dresser. 

“Picking the lock?” Spencer says “The confident profile was probably wrong then, picking the lock is controlled and definitely would fit a more inverted profile” 

Tony notices something on the dresser. 

“Guys, come over here for a sec” Morgan and Spencer come up behind him “Two necklaces on show, two bracelets to choose from, two deodorant cans, two books”

Tony points to the box of earrings.

“Was the victim wearing earrings?” He asks, Morgan brings the picture closer to his face and shakes his head. 

“Everything else is in twos except for a box of earrings, I think he took them” Tony suggests.

Morgan nods and pulls out his phone, he puts it on speaker as it rings.

“Speak or forever hold your silence” Garcia says in a low and ominous voice, Morgan grins.

“Hey baby girl, we need the medical records of our most recent victim, Sarah Hidgens, specifically for OCD or anything similar” Furious typing could be heard after Morgan spoke.

“Yes, she was diagnosed with OCD at 12”

“Great, thanks girl”

“Oh yes master, anything for you master” Garcia laughs and hangs up, Morgan shakes his head.

“So the unsub is taking trophies?” Spencer says, Morgan nods in confusion and texts Hotch that they were on their way back. 

\---

Hotch tried to not roll his eyes at the cop who admitted he didn’t want to call them in for the case because of bad media attention, the cop eventually shut up and took them into an empty meeting room. Emily and JJ didn’t take long to arrive as the family didn't speak to the victim much and had barely any information on her

Now Hotch was sitting and reading through the case file again when Morgan, Dinozzo and Reid walked through the door, the three took a seat at the table.

“The unsub is taking trophies, a pair of earrings were missing of the dresser and the victim suffered from OCD so it definitely wouldn’t have been a fault on her part” Spencer puts a picture of the dresser down on the table and Emily picks it up to look “He also picked the lock to get into the house, there was a footprint by the side of the house” He put down the photo of the footprint onto the table. 

“So a careful but left a footprint, patient, confident but picks a lock instead of breaking it, sexual sadist?” Rossi asks “That doesn’t make sense”

“It would if we were dealing with two people, one gets into the house while the other kills the women” Tony says looking up at Rossi.

“What does the partner get out of it?” JJ asks.

“Maybe they don’t get anything but they don’t want to disappoint the other?” Spencer answers “I wouldn’t say it’s romantic though, the submissive one is fully pledged to the dominant one while the dominant barely acknowledges the submissive”

“Maybe siblings? The father was absent and the younger brother looked to the older one to fill that role?” Morgan suggests.

“Ok get the officers together we’re ready to deliver the profile” Hotch says, JJ nods and leaves the room while the others grab the files. 

They walk out and Hotch steps forward first. 

“We’re dealing with two unsubs, most likely brothers, the older one is in his 30s and is strong, tall and mature and not someone you’d want to fight. The younger one is scrawny and wouldn't even look you in the eye, he looks up to his older brother because of an absent father so is extremely loyal to his brother”

“The older one will definitely not go down without a fight and has extreme anger issues, when we apprehend these unsub’s be wary of that one and take whatever means necessary” Rossi adds, Morgan sits down on an empty desk.

“These unsub’s stalk the victim long enough to know that the victim’s live alone so double patrols and look for a truck that’s big but not expensive with two men in it”

The officer that Hotch spoke to earlier nods and starts giving out instructions about patrolling. 

“Following the pattern times they will strike again tomorrow so I suggest we take our bags to the hotel and patrol ourselves” Hotch says, everyone nods and starts to walk back to the meeting room where they’re bags are

“Hotel?” Tony asks, confused, the team turn to him with equally confused faces. 

“Yeah?” Morgan replies “Did you never stay at hotel’s on cases that took longer than a day?” 

“Oh ok, we just didn’t sleep if a case took longer than a day and if we did it would be under our desk or in our chair” Tony chuckles and walks into the office to grab his bag, leaving the team behind him who look at each other with confused faces. Hotch wonders if the director is aware how Gibbs treats his agents, he shakes his head and follows Tony to grab his bag. 

They all get into their cars, Tony chooses to go with Hotch, Rossi and Spencer. Hotch and Rossi get into the front while Spencer and him pile into the back.

Tony pulls out his phone and checks for any messages, he isn’t surprised to see none from his old team. Even a text from Ziva calling him a coward for leaving would have sufficed. He wondered if they even noticed he had left and not just been late to work. 

“Are there any other differences between NCIS and here?” Spencer asked, Tony turned to him and nodded. 

“A lot like on a case we go to the crime scene and go back to NCIS and investigate it from there unless it’s far far away but at least one person will come back and serial killers are not very often” 

Spencer nods along and imagines working a case from the BAU office, he can’t imagine it and shivers at the unfamiliarity.

“I’m guessing you don't have your own medical examiner?” Tony asks and Spencer shakes his head “Ducky and Palmer are great, Palmer hasn’t been at NCIS for a long time but he’s getting as good as Ducky” Although Tony and Palmer didn’t talk much he’d like to think that they were close.

Tony drifts back off into his thoughts, and watches the scenery fly by outside the window.

Before he knows it, Hotch stops the car and they’re outside a hotel. 

Tony grabs his bag and follows the team into the doors and up to his room, he doubts he’ll be able to sleep out of habit but it’ll give him time to brush up on his profiling skills. Most of that homework might consist of watching as many Sherlock films as he can find but everyone has their own way of studying right?

He swipes his key card and walks into the hotel room, spacious, he jumps onto the bed and pulls his phone out again. Still no messages. He takes out his earphones from his bag and plugs it into his phone, he presses shuffle on his playlist.

Tony groans as Runaway by Del Shannon plays through the earphones, he yanks on the cord and turns his phone off. Runaway was one of the five songs Gibbs listens to and he’d once heard it playing through the mp3 player Abby had gotten him as a present, he’d put it on his playlist one day when he had a lot to drink and never took it off. 

Someone knocks at his door and he quickly stuffs his phone and earphones back in his pocket and leaves his hotel room, Morgan is at his door and walks down to the lobby with him. Morgan is about to start talking but his phone cuts him off, he answers it and starts running down to the lobby with Tony chasing after him.

“An officer has eyes on the unsub’s, they’re outside a woman’s house right now” Morgan quickly says, the team immediately nod and run out to their cars. Everybody piles in and they speed off to the address they’d been given. 

They stop the car at the corner where they can’t be seen, the officer slowly drives around the corner and pulls up behind them. 

“Red pickup truck, I called the plates in and it belongs to a Jackson Graham and I checked records and found William Graham, his younger brother” The officer said once he walked over to them “I managed to cut one of the electrical wires so they can’t go anywhere, orders from the captain”

Hotch walks around the corner to look at the car but quickly starts running towards the red truck, the team and the officer run after him and see the two brothers walking around the back of the house. 

The two brothers hear them running and turn around, they see the team and immediately run back to their car. Hotch realises that they won’t be able to get to them in time so turns around and starts running back to his car.

Soon Hotch is shouting orders as they are getting into the cars and Tony is getting into the passenger seat next to Morgan who was instructed to follow them, Tony notices a liquid following the car wherever they went. 

“I don’t think the officer cut an electrical wire” Tony points to the liquid trail on the road and Morgan curses, he radio’s Hotch about the trail.

“We’re coming around the corner in a second to cut him off” Hotch responds, and just as he says that they swerve around the corner. The truck also swerves but heads directly for a brick wall, Tony jumps out the car just as the car collides with the wall.

Before he can properly think, Tony is sprinting up to the passenger side of the car and is yanking on the seatbelt to free the limp body of the younger brother. He pulls out his knife and cuts the seatbelt, the body falls down and Tony pulls him out and away from the car. 

Morgan is behind him and Tony passes William off to him, he decides to risk it and runs to the drivers side of the car. Jackson wasn’t wearing a seatbelt in the crash and Tony can tell because his body is contorted under the steering wheel, he’s about to pull the steering wheel off when strong hands pull him away from the car, he wriggles to try to get back to Jackson but the arms around his waist wrestle him away. 

One spark. 

Tony sees the one spark and all of a sudden the whole car is engulfed in fire, Tony and whoever is behind him are knocked over backwards. After a couple seconds Tony sits up and looks over to William who is thankfully still unconscious in Morgan's arms. Tony turns around and sees Hotch standing up. 

Tony gets up and walks over with Hotch to the team, he hides the slight limp he has and hears sirens approaching, the lights of the firetruck and ambulance merge and soon the fire is being extinguished and William is being loaded into the back of an ambulance in handcuffs. 

A medic comes up to him but Tony waves him off, everything moves in a blur and Tony is already back in his hotel room. He lazily checks his phone again and rolls his eyes when he sees no messages. 

\---

Ziva and McGee finally leave the bullpen and Gibbs is sitting alone in the bullpen looking at Dinozzo’s desk, he looks over to the side of his desk where he’d shoved his SFA’s badge and gun. He picks up the badge and runs a finger over the marks, last time he had held this he had pushed it back into Tony’s hand. 

Now Tony had actually left, without a goodbye or a reason. 

Gibbs looked up at the director’s office, she should probably still be here. He put Tony’s badge back on his desk and walked off to the director’s office. 

“I want Dinozzo’s resignation letter” Gibbs said, Jenny looked up at him, annoyed. 

“Why?” She asked.

“I want to know the reason he left, it must have been one damn good reason for him to go straight to you instead of me” Gibbs said, he leant forward on Jenny’s desk.

“I’m not going to give you his resignation letter” Gibbs went to protest but Jenny raised her hand telling him to wait “But I will give you the report Agent Hotchner wrote for the case you worked together on” 

Gibbs was confused but still took the report and walked out of her office, he grumbled all the way down the stairs and eventually made it back to his desk. He sat down and put his glasses on, he opened the file and started reading. 

His stomach twisted the more he read.

Constant jokes insulting Agent Dinozzo’s intelligence… 

Agents Ziva and McGee’s hostility put a barrier between the two teams and caused communication problems in the case… 

Agent Gibbs’ ignorance to the blatant bullying was evident and fuelled the two said agents… 

Classic case of workplace bullying… 

Gibbs snapped the report closed and leaned back in his chair, he took his glasses off and rubbed at his face. Saying he didn’t hear the insults that Ziva and McGee made would be a lie, he thought Dinozzo didn't mind since he never made any protests. That was a stupid excuse though, the insults were more than jokes they would have angered Gibbs if they were directed at him, if it was Gibbs he would have had fired the two agents already. 

Gibbs was beating himself up, he’s obviously hurt Tony and his silence pushed Tony to the edge and now he’s gone. Gibbs was stuck with two agents who will end up throwing the rude comments at each other which will just end up in constant fighting. 

He checked the time and went down to Abby’s lab, as he expected Abby was sitting at her desk with the letter in her hands and no music playing. 

“I need a favour” He said coming up behind her, Abby turned to him and tear streaks were evident on her face.

“What do you need?” Abby sniffled and turned on her computer. 

“I need you to find Dinozzo’s address” Gibbs said, he knew Tony and knew that he would have moved.

Without typing anything into her computer Abby said an address, Gibbs was going to smile but remembered the circumstances. 

“I can also tell you that he now works at the BAU for the FBI and that he’s on a case and currently staying in room 216” Abby told Gibbs the name of the hotel, Gibbs kissed Abby’s cheek and walked out the lab. 

He wasn’t going to go to Tony’s hotel, not while he was on a case although it was going to take a lot of convincing to not go to his new apartment when the case was over. 

He didn’t know what he wanted. 

He didn’t know what he would say. 

He didn’t know what he would do. 

And Gibbs hated it, after Shannon he never thought he would know what real ‘wanting’ was and that was further proved by the next three wives. 

And then he went to Baltimore. 

Gibbs hated how he felt, Tony was young, had a girl every week and was his subordinate yet Gibbs found himself smiling at the younger man’s jokes and watching him from across the room. Now, Tony had left because he was an ignorant idiot that was stupid for thinking Tony was unhuman and could handle the bullying he got day in and day out. 

\---

Tony was woken from his power nap by knocking on the door, he shook his head in an effort to fully wake up and walked over to the door. Thankfully he had fallen asleep in his clothes so he didn't have to worry about who it was, Morgan stood in front of the door with a grin plastered on his face. 

“The team are going out for drinks, nothing hard though, we still need to get a confession tomorrow” Morgan said, Tony didn’t need time to think, he quickly checked he had his phone and grabbed his keycard. 

He followed Morgan down to the lobby where the team were, except for Emily and JJ but they followed close behind Tony and Morgan. They all crossed the street and walked a couple blocks until they reached a nice bar.

Tony immediately went to the bar and ordered the drinks for him and the team before anyone could pay for themselves. Hotch and Rossi came over to help carry the drinks back to the booth they’d chosen, everyone thanked Tony and some even tried to sneak money back into Tony’s pocket which ended in failed attempts and laughter. 

In an hour, almost everyone was tipsy and laughing loudly. Tony was starting to get woozy and the urge to text Gibbs became stronger and stronger. He pulled his phone out and pushed it into Spencer’s sober hands, Spencer looked at the phone confused. 

“Don’t let me text him” Tony mumbled, before Spencer could say anything Emily had dragged Tony to the dance floor where Morgan and JJ were having the time of their lives. 

Spencer looked at Hotch who was sitting next to him and shrugged, he pocketed the phone and continued sipping at his water. 

Hotch watched Spencer, he wasn’t drunk, not exactly tipsy either, he had a buzz going but he’d blame that on his thigh touching Spencer’s. Hotch stole Rossi’s drink and downed it in one go, Rossi was busy texting a potential future Mrs Rossi so he didn’t notice, Hotch winced at the surprising strength of Rossi’s drink. He tapped Spencer and pointed to the door, Spencer furrowed his brow but nodded and got out of the booth. 

Without thinking, Hotch grabbed Spencer’s hand and pulled him through the crowded bar and out the door. When they made it outside, Spencer made no move to pull his hand away from Hotch’s so Hotch smiled and gripped Spencer’s hand. 

Hotch and Spencer walked around the building and stopped when they turned the corner.

“Spencer, I- um… thought this was going to be easier” Hotch laughed and looked down at the floor. 

Spencer gulped, he wondered if Hotch was going to admit some type of feelings for Spencer but Spencer hit himself for that thought. Hotch was straighter than straight and their age gap was probably too much for Hotch.

“Hotch?” Spencer asked, he placed his free hand on Hotch’s shoulder. 

“I like you, I have for a while” Hotch paused “It’s completely fine if you don’t feel the same I just needed to get it out there” Hotch was still looking down, when he looked up Spencer almost had tears in his eyes. 

Hotch’s eyes widened and was going to start speaking again but all of a sudden lips were on his, their hands separated but were quickly back on each other. When they pulled away for air they rested their foreheads against each other, they both started laughing. 

Tony went back to his drink and chugged it down, he yelled at Rossi that he was going back to the hotel and walked out the bar. He stumbled out the door but quickly regained his balance. Tony let the door close behind him and sighed when the music from the bar went down to a quiet level, he could hear two guys talking around the corner so he quickly walked away from the bar and started walking to the hotel. 

Tony passed a payphone and stopped, he walked over to the payphone and stared at it. He subconsciously patted his pockets and quickly produced the change for the machine. Putting the money in he punched the numbers in through muscle memory and picked up the phone, he held it up to his ear and it rang three times before Gibbs' voice flowed through the phone.

“Gibbs” 

Tony gulped and stuttered, he’d just called Gibbs at who-knows-what time. No words came out until eventually he swallowed down the lump in his throat and spoke.

“Hi”

“Dinozzo? Did you get a new phone?” 

“Uhhh no, this is a pay phone” Tony mumbled, he leant against the payphone box and listened to the sound of Gibbs moving around. 

“Are you ok?” Gibbs asked, Tony nodded obviously forgetting he was on the phone.

“Yeah, I- no” Tony sighed, he was 110% sure that he would regret this in the morning. 

“Tony, I’m sorry” Gibbs said, Tony’s rush of adrenaline was slowly sobering him.

“I thought saying sorry was a sign of weakness” He mumbled.

“Sometimes it's needed, and I am deeply sorry, I’m not going to make excuses, I knew I should have said something and I didn’t” Gibbs explained “when you’re case is over I’d love to come over and have a proper conversation, I won’t try and convince you to come back” He reassures.

“I’d like that” Tony said “Wait, how’d you know I was on a case?” 

“Abby told me,” Gibbs admitted, Tony laughed. He’d be surprised if Abby hadn’t looked for him even if it was slightly illegal.

A man came up behind Tony, obviously waiting to use the payphone. 

“I’ve got to go, I’ll text you” Tony said and put the phone back onto the payphone, the man nodded to him and stepped forward into the box when Tony left. 

What had he just done?

What was he going to do when Gibbs came to his house, he wasn't going to forgive him right away, Gibbs’ silence had pushed him to leaving NCIS and losing his pseudo family. Tony knew what he wanted, he knew that Gibbs couldn’t give that to him though, Gibbs has had 4 wives and a daughter at one point the chances of Gibbs even considering Tony as a partner was a joke. 

Tony had always pushed those feelings down, not even thinking about them until he lay in bed at night. It was tiring, when he had realised his feelings he had slept with every woman he could to get rid of those feelings, when they didn’t leave he gave up on his sex crusade and resorted to silent pining. 

Checking his watch he sighed and walked back to the hotel.

He made it into his room and jumped onto his bed, he groaned when he realised he had to get up and get changed. He rolled out of bed and went into the bathroom with his toothbrush and toothpaste from his bag, he got changed with his toothbrush in his mouth and once he was done he climbed under the covers and immediately fell asleep. 

\---

Spencer rolled over in his bed and collided with something, his eyes shot open and he saw the sleeping form of Aaron next to him. The previous night came back to him and he slowly moved closer to Hotch, he watched the rise and fall of his bare and chest and admired the way his face looked so peaceful.

“Enjoying yourself?” Hotch asks with his eyes still closed, Spencer almost jumps out of bed, Aaron laughs and turns on his side to face him. 

Aaron grabs Spencer's waist and rolls on top of him, Spencer yelps and laughs.

“You don’t regret anything do you?” Aaron asks, he needs to make sure they were on the same page before they went any further. 

“None of it” Spencer smiles and cups Aaron’s face, he leans up and kisses the man on top of him.

“Keep doing that and we’ll be late” Aaron manages to say as Spencer starts kissing down his neck. 

“And?” Spencer pulls away and looks up at Aaron, last night probably awarded him the right to use his first name and while he couldn't use it while they were at work you could bet Aaron would be sick of his own name every time they were in private.

Aaron smiles in response and shakes his head, he rolls off of Spencer and sits up with his feet touching the carpeted floor. Spencer comes up behind him and runs his hands over Aaron’s shoulder’s, Aaron relaxes into Spencer’s touch and leans his head back onto Spencer’s shoulder.

Soon they are both up and dressed, Spencer opens the door and checks the hallway. 

“It’s clear” He says, he turns around and kisses Aaron before running down the hall. 

Tony walks from his room and Spencer freezes, they look at each other for a minute before Tony grins knowingly. Spencer curses and quickly makes it back to his room and shuts the door behind him. 

Tony laughs and continues down the hallway, he passes the room he had seen Spencer leave and looks up at the number. 

Hotch and Spencer were hooking up? 

Wow, he did not expect that, he should brush up on his profiling skills. He walks down the hall and knocks on Morgan’s door, a sleepy Morgan groans as he answers the door.

“Do you have the keys to one of the cars?” 

Morgan nods and walks back into his room, he reemerges and pushes the keys into Tony’s hands. Tony thanks him and continues down the hallway to the elevator, he makes it outside and walks across to the cafe he’d seen on his walk back last night.

Last night. 

Tony wanted to hit himself, he had even given Spencer his phone to stop him from calling Gibbs and he still found a way. 

He winces as the loud bell pierces through his hangover and walks up to the woman, he orders a coffee and nods to her with a smile when his receipt has her number on it. He grabs the coffee and walks over to the car, he drives down to the police station and asks the officer to move William into the interrogation room.

It was early so William will be tired and therefore more compliant plus the waiting for the rest of his team will put William constantly on edge. A trick Gibbs used every time for interrogations. 

The team walked in just as Tony was finishing his coffee, Spencer didn’t look him in the eye. 

“I like to get an early start” Tony explained, he was still getting used to the differences between NCIS and the BAU especially with the times. 

Hotch walks into the viewing room with everyone else behind him, Hotch turns to Tony. 

“Do you want to interview him?” Hotch asks, Tony is about to say that it isn’t his case and rule 38 but quickly gets rid of that thought and nods. 

“Sure” Dinozzo walks out of the room and into the other, William looks up at him. Tony sits down in front of him and stays silent until William starts shifting uncomfortably in his seat.

“What were you doing at that woman’s house?” Tony finally asks. 

“My brother and I heard a woman crying,” William said. 

“You sure?” Tony said, he pretended to be writing this down but was actually just drawing a house on the paper.

“Yeah” William looked down, Tony put the notepad and pen down and leaned forward on the table. 

“Is that what your brother told you to say if you ever got caught?” He whispered, William looked up and shook his head. 

“Did you kill the women or did your brother?” Tony asked, William shook his head again “We noticed that a pair of earrings were missing from Sarah’s bedroom, did you take them William?” 

“I didn’t kill them,” William mumbled.

“Your brother did?”

“No,” William said and started fiddling with the cuffs on his hands. Tony stayed silent again and kept staring at him, William sighed and looked up into Tony’s eyes, he nodded. 

“Jacks told me to take the earrings, he said he wanted to remember her” William mumbled, Tony nodded along and finished drawing the house. He got up and walked out the room, the team walked out at the same time. 

“Is that everything you need?” Tony asks and Hotch nods with a smile. 

Everyone sighs and talks about their plans for the weekend. Tony realised he was now over with the case which meant seeing Gibbs, he wanted to talk to Gibbs and finally close that chapter of his life but he also knew that it would be hard to cut off his feelings for Gibbs. 

\---

Gibbs laid in bed with his hands on his chest, he didn’t know what he was going to do when he went over to Tony’s. He was going to have to beg on his hands and knees for forgiveness, he knew Tony couldn’t give that to him right away though. 

He sighed and rolled over in bed, on his bedside table lay the unopened letter with his name in Tony’s handwriting. Reading the letter would finalise Tony’s leaving and Gibbs wanted to live in his ignorant bliss a little while longer.

HIs phone started ringing and he saw Dinozzo’s name pop up on the screen.

“Gibbs” He slowly answered.

“Hey, my case is over and I’m on the jet back to Quantico and was wondering if you want to come by tonight?” Tony asked, even over the phone Gibbs could tell he was nervous. 

“Yeah, that works for me, I’ll see you tonight” Gibbs smiled and sat up in bed, the two said their goodbyes and Gibbs almost skipped down to his basement to grab the keys to his car. 

Tony put his phone back into his pocket and picked up a book about profiling, he’d ordered it when he had gotten out of hospital and hadn’t had a chance to read it yet. He got bored through the first page and yawned, Rossi got out of his seat and into the seat next to Tony. The older italian snatched the book from Tony’s hand and scoffed when he read the title, he handed a different book to Tony.

Tony looked down at the book and saw the author was David Rossi, he looked up at him with a smile. 

“This guy sucks, doesn’t even work a profiling job” Rossi looks down at the book in his hands and puts the book back in Tony’s bag. Tony laughs and flips Rossi’s book open, before he can start reading Rossi speaks up.

“Was that a date you were calling?” Rossi implies.

“No, just a friend” Tony says, Rossi nods coyly and walks back over to his seat next to Hotch. 

Tony speedily reads through the book, despite what Ziva and McGee said he actually read a lot and visited his library regularly, most of them were books that movies were based off but that's beside the point. 

It’s getting dark and the plane ride is almost over, Tony puts the book into his bag and exits the jet, the rest of the team are talking about the amount of paperwork they’re going to have for this case and Tony is planning his funeral for when he meets up with Gibbs. 

Tony gets in his car and drives home while drumming his fingers against the wheel, he gets to his apartment building and parks the car outside. He takes the stairs up to his apartment and decides that he’ll cook for Gibbs, something casual like caprese chicken. 

Tony’s stomach rumbles at the thought of food and that's when he realises he hadn't eaten anything for two days and that also explains why he got drunk so fast at the bar. His mind mentally checks that he has everything to make the dish and smiles when he realises he has and that the big shopping haul was worth it. 

When he turns the corner on the hallway to his apartment Gibbs is there leaning against his door, Tony freezes and Gibbs looks up at him. 

“Hi” Tony says, he gets his keys out and walks up to his door. He walks in and takes off his jacket while Gibbs shuts the door behind him, Gibbs takes off his coat and Tony gestures over to the couch. Gibbs sits down while Tony puts his go bag away in his bedroom, when he walks back out he stands in the doorway and decides what to do. 

“I’m doing caprese chicken, would you like to join me?” Tony asks, Gibbs nods and follows Tony into the kitchen. Tony bends down and opens the fridge, he pulls out two beers and hands one to Gibbs and puts the other on the counter. He pulls out all the ingredients and gets to work.

“Tony, I am sorry for not doing anything,” Gibbs says looking at Tony's back, his eyes focused on Tony’s arms moving under the tight button up shirt that pulls when he peppers and salts the chicken. Tony nods while putting the two pieces of chicken into the pan, he has to let them cook for six minutes each side. He turns around and grabs his beer, he would usually have expensive red wine with a meal like this but he forgot to grab his favourite wine from his local supplier before he moved. 

He puts the beer back down and looks at Gibbs, he can tell that Gibbs is beating himself up inside. 

“How are Abby and the others?” He asks, moving the conversation away from him. 

“Abby hasn’t left her lab since you left, Ducky and Palmer pass on their regards and Ducky says you’re welcome to call him for anything” Gibbs says, Tony smiles and nods, he also notices how Gibbs doesn’t mention McGee or Ziva. 

“Tell Abby she has my blessing to go home” Tony says, he makes a mental note to call her tomorrow. Gibbs smiles and takes another swig of his beer, Tony gulps as he watches Gibbs adam apple bob.

“And how have you been?” Tony says, Gibbs looks back down at him. 

“Stressed” He chuckles “McGee and Ziva won’t shut up, cases are harder and Shepard is complaining about the lack of work getting done” Gibbs rolls his eyes, Tony nods along, Tony guessed it wouldn’t be long before McGee and Ziva turn against each other.

“How was the case?” Gibbs asks, trying to get away from McGee and Ziva, Tony becomes silent when he recalls the case. 

“Two brothers, older one was murdering women and the younger one picked the locks and what not” Tony explains “We found them outside a house and one of the officers cut a wire he thought would stop the car but it started leaking gas while we chased them, they ended up driving into a wall and I managed to save the younger one, William, before the car blew up” Tony took another drink and turned back around to flip the chicken breasts. 

“How is William?” 

“He wasn’t injured more than a few cuts and bruises from the crash, I got a confession today” Tony said, turning back around to face Gibbs. 

“How are you?” He asks, Tony nods. 

“I’m fine, Hotch pulled me back before the car blew up” 

“Is the BAU alright for you?” Gibbs askes, Tony almost laughs at Gibbs sounding borderline protective. 

“They’re fine, smart people, maybe too smart for me so I’ve been watching every possible movie I can and I’ve even ordered books” Tony says.

“I’ll bet every buck I have that no one on that team could do a job better than you” Gibbs says, Tony rolls his eyes and Gibbs has to hold himself back from slapping his head “They see what I see when you were a cop in baltimore, don’t downplay your skills” 

Tony ducked his head and took another drink of his beer to hide his face, Gibbs smiled at Tony. 

“Thanks boss” Tony said then froze, he put his drink down and looked at the floor, he heard Gibbs laugh. 

“I think you’ve earned calling me Jethro” He said, Tony looked up to Gibbs, shocked, and smiled.

“Well give me a hand would you, Jethro” Tony said, trying out the name, behind him Gibbs’ stomach flipped at Tony using his first name. He walked over next to Tony and looked down at the food. 

Tony moved the chicken over to a plate and poured balsamic vinegar into the pan and he handed Gibbs a handful of garlic and a wooden spoon. 

“Pour them in and stir them around until they’re brown” Tony says and walks away, Gibbs does as instructed and carefully stirs all the garlic around. Tony walks back over with a bowl of grape tomatoes, he checks the garlic and grins. Gibbs looks down proudly at his work and watches as Tony tips the bowl into the pan.

“Can you pass me the salt please” Tony asks, Gibbs walks away from a second and returns with the tin of salt. Tony pinches the salt and sprinkles it over the tomatoes.

“Now we let those simmer for 5 minutes” Tony turns away from the pan and Gibbs does the same, Tony and Gibbs stand frozen in the moment looking at each other. Gibbs quickly leans forward and Tony is quick to respond, they both reach for the back of each other’s necks. Gibbs moves Tony down the counter away from all the cooking things and shoves Tony against it, Tony hissed from pain of the counter digging into his back but was too immersed in the kiss to care. Gibbs’ hands run through Tony’s hair and down Tony’s sides, he grabs Tony’s waist and brings Tony up to sit on the counter. Tony grinned down at Gibbs and quickly continued kissing him, Gibbs had both hands on Tony’s thighs and rubbed circles with his thumbs.   
Tony pulled away for breath and smiled at Gibbs.

“I need to add basil” Tony breathes, Gibbs nods and Tony gets down off the counter. Gibbs stands behind Tony and watches his hands move, he adds basil and puts the chicken back into the pan.

Tony reaches over and grabs the mozzarella, he lays one piece over each piece of chicken and puts the lid to the pan and waits for the mozzarella to melt. He’s painfully aware of Gibbs standing over his shoulder and shudders when his breath ghosts over his neck. He pulls the lid off and grabs the wooden spoon. 

“Would you like to do the honours Jethro?” Tony asks, Gibbs nods and his hands slide under Tony’s arms and grab the spoon. Gibbs moves the grape tomatoes and other ingredients over the chicken while Tony adds a slight bit of olive oil over the chicken. 

Tony moves the two plates over and places the chicken on the plate, once he's done he grabs the spoon from Gibbs’ hand and spoons the rest of the grape tomatoes and basil over to fill the plate.

They move over to the table and sit down, they eat in comfortable silence the only talk being praise from Gibbs for the meal. 

“Did you ever consider becoming a chef?” Gibbs asks, Tony nods. 

“When I was younger, it seemed like a reliable option but my heart changed over time to being a cop” Tony says, they quickly finish and are soon carrying the dishes over to the sink.

“Thank you for tonight” Gibbs says, he hands his plate to Tony who puts them in the sink and turns to him. Tony nods and avoids looking at Gibbs, it was cliche but did the kiss mean something for them? 

Gibbs obviously senses Tony’s thoughts, he was always good at knowing what Tony was thinking, it was strange. He lifts Tony’s head and kisses him again.

“I want us to be something more but it’s your decision” Gibbs says, Tony smiles and rests his head forward on Gibbs’ shoulder and kisses up Gibbs’ neck.

“I want that too” Tony says into Gibbs’ neck, Gibbs nods and smiles. 

A beautiful beginning.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading :)


End file.
